Author: standupandlivelife

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I don’t want to miss any of you dear readers. You have been with me through this blog’s seedling year. Stick with us for greater things to come!

So far, I love substitute teaching! I was quite nervous to begin with, but now that I have 2 whole days under my belt, I’m liking it. I admit, 2 days of experience hardly makes me the expert. I am surprised though, that each day brought me a valuable revelation for the times I’m wearing my “mom hat”.

First, I was given kindergarten. When I arrived at school and received my assignment, lo and behold, it was my daughter’s former teacher! My daughter walked around the room with me explaining the different routines and spaces. I think she was having just as much fun as I was. I felt much more confident knowing the teacher’s personality and style of teaching.

After school, I felt 8 times as annoyed by any bit of disorder at home than I usually do. Even though I felt pretty exhausted from the day, by the time I had been home an hour I made the girls tidy up, cooked dinner, and made everyone sit at the table with no screens allowed. My older one told me, “Mom, you forgot to turn off your teacher voice!”

I discovered, or maybe rediscovered, that I crave structure. I usually think of myself as a mostly flexible, go-with-the-flow kind of person. But oh the power; when I said, “snack time is over,” 16 kids immediately cleaned up their own mess and returned to their seats, ready to learn. I only have 2 at home, but I’m pretty sure whenever I speak they just hear bla, bla, bla! Well, not tonight kiddos! That goes for you too dad! And oh the joy when books are put back on the shelf and play dough stays on the table nearest the sink, and paper scraps are gathered up and brought to the wastebasket.

Then I had 3rd graders. It was a truly nice class, not a troublemaker in it. One was a sensitive soul, crushed to tears when reprimanded. It helped to be reminded that everyone makes mistakes, and making mistakes just means you’re trying your best. Others had a fight on the morning bus. The teachers helped the two talk it out. But one confided in me that this is nothing new, it happens every day. One started the day with a visit to the school nurse. Although this seemed suspiciously like a ploy, that one went home after lunch.

My revelation from this day is, kids have a lot going on. A lot that they typically just keep inside. Maybe when they go home, they need that time to just be. Not hold it together, not use their words, not push down their emotions because now it’s time for math, not to worry whether they’re getting sent to the principal’s office or someone’s going to pick a fight with them or their answer is wrong.

My two revelations seem conflicting, but just maybe they will help me achieve a better balance in my home. Just orderly enough for my sanity, just chaotic enough for theirs.

My life as an adult was just beginning. I had moved to a town where the need for Kingdom preachers was great. It was a step in the right direction toward reaching my biggest goal, to become a missionary. My roommate and I discovered we shared that goal in common! At the convention that summer we met a family who had moved to Ecuador. The enthusiasm and joy literally sparked from their eyes as they told us about it, and we hung on every word. Ecuador was the perfect place for us to go. The government is relatively stable and welcoming to foreigners. The cost of living is low. The branch office of Jehovah’s Witnesses there has a practice of welcoming need greaters (as we call people who move to away from their home area to preach).

I’ve been reading in my journals from that time in my life:

7/4/97

“I can’t believe it! We’re going to Ecuador. Life is so crazy. You work so hard for something for so long and it just seems like it’s not happening. Then all of a sudden, boom! Jehovah blesses you. It’s hard to even imagine what it will be like.”

And then I read the exact same thought in a thank you note from a dear friend of mine who moved to Ecuador a couple of years later. Here’s what she wrote:

“I am just excited that I am finally getting to go to Ecuador. It still doesn’t seem totally real. You plan something so long you just think it will always be a plan. ”

Me with my luggage and my jet lag and homesickness on the first day.So you adventure seeking intrepid young pioneers out there, DON’T STOP PLANNING! Jehovah will get you there. We had our fears of course. Before we went, we spent many sleepless nights agonizing over the unknowns. We heard countless warnings and doubts expressed.
These fears are also reflected in my journal entries. To do lists. Letters to the branch office. Notes to organise our thoughts for phone calls requesting more information.

In the one above, my friend has a bullet point; “find out if Cara’s hair needs to be dyed”. I mean really!?! Apparently someone had suggested that as a safety measure, so I wouldn’t stand out as much.

On another page were worries about living arrangements. We didn’t have an apartment or even a specific town chosen when we went. And honestly, I think that was a good way.

After experiencing firsthand Jehovah’s guidance and the love of our worldwide brotherhood, I will never let fear of the unknown stop me! And I’m beyond glad that I didn’t let it stop me then! Mount Chimborazo was literally at our doorstep.

I ended up spending 2 months in Ecuador. My roommate stayed for 8 months. My friend who wrote the card I quoted stayed 10 years! (I think?)
By going there I met friends who truly influenced my life for the better. The family who took us in and helped us get settled. The father of that family presided over lunch at siesta time and made the daily text an event you didn’t want to miss. The mother treated us like her own daughters. Their sons and daughters treated us like siblings. The American boys of a need greater family who truly understood what we were feeling because they had been there. The brothers at the branch office who welcomed us personally despite the busy schedule they already have. The Irish family in the jungle who’s five year old blonde braided daughter spoke Spanish with an Ecuadorian accent and peppered her English with Spanish words.

Riding on top of the bus.

I had adventures like being herded off a bus and crossing a raging river on a log. On the other side another bus was waiting to take us the rest of the way. We climbed mountains, swam in caves, held snakes, white water rafted on a tributary to the Amazon, danced all night (with the required hip movements that were considered taboo in our northern Minnesota home), preached all day. The humble people loved to learn about the Bible. It was easy to start conversations.

Being one of Jehovah’s Witnesses can be so much more than just a religion, a Sunday ritual. Jehovah knows what we need. He pushes even the shyest to break out by requesting that we preach the good news. He knows that it’s good for us. This satisfaction is not to be had from any other job or career. I knew that before I went, but I felt it in my heart afterwards.

A friend of mine was recently hit with some really bad news. Her breast cancer metastasized. She blogs and she uses social media like most of us. So I saw her post on Instagram, a photo of a doctor’s whiteboard drawing of internal organs. I didn’t yet feel too deep a sense of dread. Even though she had been battling breast cancer, she was in remission. Her recent posts had been upbeat, forward looking. Things were finally looking up for her.

Then I clicked the link and read her news.

I finally was able to look at Instagram again tonight, almost a week later. I may never look at it the same again. How can I look at all these posts of trips and scenery and babies born? How can I post anything there? It feels like everything is frivolous, just filling the air with emptiness. It’s not important. Every feed on Instagram should have stopped. Hers should be the last one. Everyone who looks from now on should only see her doctor’s handiwork and a link to her devastating diagnosis. How can we feel lighthearted? Go about our business?

And yet every day people get earth-shattering news, just like she did. Will stopping everything honor them and their struggle? If they can still retain a spark of optimism and gratitude right through the midst of heartbreak, shouldn’t we?

So this is my prayer for her; may her hope be a secure anchor, may our God grant her strength, and may she never doubt she is loved!

Post script: To my dear friend: Thank you for letting me blog about your experiences. Ever since we met each other via letter at 11 years old, writing has been our bond! Writing this helped me process and cope, as writing your story in your blog has helped you. You are facing this challenge with fortitude and style. And you are not alone! I’m so glad to have you as a friend!

I feel like I just wrote my “school’s out” post, and it’s already time for the “back to school post”! I have been loving the flurry of first day pictures posted by friends and relatives on Instagram.

The way the world is set up nowadays, our children spend a very large chunk of their day in school. Like it or not, they are going to be influenced by and receive formative messages from virtual strangers. In order to be in on it a little, I volunteer in my daughter’s school, and I recently also applied to substitute teach there. (Eeek, stay tuned for updates on that!)

I spent a couple of hours last week in her school’s library, shelf reading. That is, making sure each book is in it’s proper spot on the library shelf. Ideally, it should be done before the classes start checking out books next month. It’s a tedious, not overly difficult task. Fortunately for me, I was able to observe a couple of very well taught classes while I was sorting out messy shelves. Just what I needed at this moment.

My experience with teaching as a volunteer Bible teacher is done primarily one-on-one with a student. So I have been stressing a bit about how I will keep twenty-some gradeschoolers on task and engaged. And all of this without yelling or losing my temper. I do NOT want to be THAT teacher.

My daughter’s class had a few different substitutes last year. Watching the class and teachers struggle through that made me start remembering my school years. Yup, we were not nice to the substitute, and don’t tell me your elementary school class was the exception to that. Am I right? I didn’t want to do that to myself!

And then, as usually happens in my life, a random conversation (this time with a complete stranger, a mom I met at a park) reignited that spark of an idea. The second time around, I decided to go with it. The thought of making a little money while not detracting from the time and energy I give the girls was already in my head. I am in the school volunteering anyways, so why not get paid to be there? And my random mom friend gave me the boost of confidence I needed. She is a teacher by profession, and she said, “You could totally be a substitute teacher!”

To calm my nerves about this new adventure, I have been doing a lot of reading. This is what I always do. In fact perusing Pinterest for parenting blogs is what got me started blogging in the first place.

Here are 4 tips for effective teaching that I hope to remember and use:

Use positive motivation like compassion and praise.

Don’t talk louder than a speaking voice.

Let them feel success by starting with an assignment you know they can complete.

Keep order by using routines. Keep the number of rules to a minimum. Rules require punishment for breaking them, routines give structure without putting you in the position of enforcer.

I love all of those ideas. I also felt reassured to read that even experienced teachers get nervous on the first day of school.

HowEVER . . . Every day is the first day for a substitute! I won’t know the routines already set in motion by the regular teacher. I won’t know anyone’s name. I won’t know which kids not to pair up for group assignments because they will get too rowdy. Once again I say eeeek!

My observations at school today left me feeling greatly encouraged. I found everything I had just read being modeled before my eyes. The teachers didn’t raise their voices. They allowed for interaction and feedback, but they were able to quickly regain the group’s attention using techniques like counting backwards from five, or clapping a pattern and waiting for the reply clapping. I heard a teacher start the class period by praising his students for how well they had done in that subject last week. The lesson included being read to, doing a treasure hunt, and a worksheet. Very engaging! And when a student’s attention wandered, the teacher simply asked, “Would you like to participate in this activity?” Not a threat, just a simple question. I felt grateful to be able to observe and learn such solid teaching practices. And even more at ease with putting my daughter’s education in these strangers’ hands.

Realistically, no classroom is going to have the perfect environment 100% of the time. I know from experience that patience at times runs out when you’re dealing with kids. But I also know that when the adults in the room react calmly and dignify the children by treating them like real people, tensions tend to evaporate. Motivation to work hard at anything comes from excitement, joy, interest. If a teacher has the skills to tap into that, the student will gladly cooperate.

My fear is that being in a classroom will probably tip the balance of my precarious truce within myself on the question of homeschooling. I may just end up saying, “this does not work, why are we doing this to our kids”?! If that happens, I will be facing an even greater challenge than motivating a classroom full of kiddos; motivating my own kids!

So, please keep rooting for me. I’m a newbie, and I need all the help I can get. If any of you have experience in a classroom, please share your nuggets of wisdom! You can comment here, on Instagram @standupandlivelife, on Twitter @standuplivelife, or on my Facebook page.

So, this was what I promised to write more about. Learning a language teaches you so much more than just words. I learned that in our brain words, memories, and emotions are inextricably linked to each other.

My introduction to a new language

My first time visiting Latvia was two years before we moved there. We spent a month. We both knew we wanted to move there but we also knew it would be wise to give it a test run.

I spent most of that month feeling like I was in my own little world. The friends were so welcoming. They treated us like royalty. But they didn’t speak English or they were embarrassed to try or they purposely didn’t so I would be forced to learn Latvian faster. I kept pestering my husband for translations, but he soon got tired of doing that.

At times I would listen attentively to everything going on around me, making guesses and hoping to piece together something of what was being said. Other times my brain was too fried to even try and I just sat there, letting everything wash over me.

Immersion

A quaint little train station that I passed every day on my commute to my Latvian class. Photo credit @murmurmuliite

Two years later, we moved there, to the same city we had visited. It felt like coming home. The first few months were quite a blur. I spent every morning going to language class and every afternoon in the ministry practicing what I had learned. I really studied hard. Having such an accelerated course meant I was learning grammar I certainly couldn’t use yet, so it was difficult. But I was so determined to make this place my home that I didn’t mind a bit.

One of the first things we did was attend the biggest event of the summer for Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Regional Convention. It’s a three day event, and in a small country like Latvia everyone goes to the same one. It was a great way to start out, because we got to meet a lot of new friends right away.

My conversations were primitive since I hadn’t learned much Latvian yet, though at the time I thought we understood each other quite well despite the language barrier. The following year at convention I found that I could remember faces of the ones I had met but not names, and nothing at all of our conversations. Pictures, but no words.

I began to realize that our brains use language to help store memories.

The link to emotions

I was amazed to discover that words gradually gain more emotional impact as they become tied to specific memories. For example, my mind knows that the Latvian verb ‘to love’ is mīlēt. But the number of times my brain had connected that word with the feeling of being loved was relatively few. So my brain understood but my heart didn’t. Apparently, if it doesn’t cause an emotional response, the brain files that thought under “not important”.

On the other hand, if someone started using foul language around me or even at me, it didn’t bother me at all. Those words were just a string of sounds with zero emotional meaning.

Our mysterious brain

I never expected that learning another language would allow me to feel how powerful words are. How they shape our memory of events and our emotional reactions.

There was a big hole in my life when I couldn’t communicate freely. I discovered how very much I need people and interactions and conversations, the exchange of ideas. In English, I prided myself on being able to choose just the right word to express exactly what I meant. Now I was restricted to a basic set of vocabulary. So, in my case, it was desperation that helped me learn.

What should you do?

Total immersion into Latvian worked for me. It had growing pains. It was a shock to the system. The most agonizing moment was the time I met a sweet older lady who really wanted to know if God cares, why do people suffer. My language capabilities only allowed me to say, “The answer is in the Bible.” After much study and a few months of practice, I was able to return and answer her question, thankfully!

Language and communication are truly a gift. I never understood that as fully as when I learned a new language, full immersion style.

Somehow, where a person grows up defines them. This seems to be a recurring theme in my life lately.

At my recent checkup, my doctor asked whether I had made any trips to third world countries lately. I jokingly said “Indiana, to visit my sister”. He asked where I was originally from and when I said Minnesota, he seemed satisfied. “That makes sense, because why would she move to Indiana if you were from the East coast?” Then he apologized in a lighthearted way for his prejudicial view on what he considered a “downward” move. I laughed and said it was no big deal, my husband has felt the same way since I met him. He considered New England to be the proverbial promised land.

New Englanders aren’t the only ones guilty of an inordinate pride based solely on geographic location. On the highway which slithers northward along Lake Superior toward Canada, there stood a billboard blazing the words, “Tired of the rat race?” I discovered recently that piece of advertising shaped my entire view on where to live. I’ve always felt that the “smart ones” escape big city life to settle in some remote northern territory. A place paradisaic in beauty during the summer, but barely habitable in winter due to massive snow banks and deadly wind chills. These are the ones who were living their hamster wheel lives, but one day while fishing on a northern lake during their one week of vacation, they decide it’s not worth it. They decide to quit fighting the traffic snarls on their way to a dog-eat-dog corporate job in the city. Why wait until retirement to enjoy nature every day?

I was not one of those “smart ones” trickling in from the nearest big city. I was lucky enough to have been born there. I didn’t have to learn my lesson the hard way. I was already in God’s country, and only I was going to choose where and when to leave.

Researchers have pinpointed a connection between our sense of smell and our memory. A few years ago on a family road trip we drove through Wisconsin in summer. The smell of the wildflowers and fresh mown grass along the country highway took me instantly back to my childhood. It felt strange to have my senses supersede conscious thought and transport me bodily to a time and place I didn’t know I had forgotten. No gourmet dinner could smell better. No luscious perfume could have delighted me more. In that moment of recognition I became “me” in a way I hadn’t felt in decades.

I feel enriched for having these realizations about my roots. Would I have had them without leaving? Maybe not. Each place I have moved has set off a new evolution of self within me. I first seek to understand and fit in with the locals. At some point I discover some fundamental way I differ. Unconsciously, I analyze whether this difference is something I like and agree with or not. At some still further point I inevitably find a difference between myself and my new abode that I refuse to assimilate. I then go through a rebellion of sorts, as I stubbornly assert my own identity shaped by my home.

I’ve come to welcome this process. Even though some of it can be painful in the moment. It’s part of what makes travel and moving so positive. It has helped me learn about myself in ways that would never have been possible. The only problem with this is people who understand my perspective have become fewer and farther between.

The other day we were walking on a quiet street in Pawtucket and saw a home for sale. I wondered aloud what it might cost (this curiosity comes from having a builder husband). My friend asked whether we would consider buying a home there. I said probably not. We would be more likely to look for a place in a quieter area. She couldn’t understand what more I could be looking for. Only 2 cars had driven by on that street in 30 minutes. She said, “that’s only because you come from ultra wilderness.” I agreed.

When I get near a lake, any lake, my whole being exhales and each muscle releases all accumulated tension. The waves greet the shore with a display of sound and reflected light that changes by the moment. The sky meets water like a friend and opens up to reveal it’s beauty, whether it be breathtaking sunsets or enigmatic cloud formations or pinpricks of star shine on a blanket of blackness. Each season displays it’s own shade of blue in sky and water. Each day has it’s own mood ranging from introspective stillness to raging froth. And when I slide into the water, it envelops me like a womb, and I am home.